Kindness repaid with savagery

Courtney Churchward (left) and Lori-Lea Te Wini murdered pensioner John Rowe. Photos / Rotorua Daily Post

John Rowe leaned across the fence to give his teenage neighbour oranges from a tree in his garden. A short time later, she returned with her cousin to his house and killed him during a burglary.

Yesterday, Mr Rowe's teenage killers were sentenced in the High Court at Rotorua to life in prison with a minimum non-parole period of 17 years.

Courtney Pauline Churchward, 18, and Lori-Lea Waiora Te Wini, 15, had been found guilty last month of murdering the 78-year-old retired mathematics teacher in Opotiki in November last year.

They beat him repeatedly in his bed with a bulky walking staff and a thin rod which he used to close his curtains.

Mr Rowe's son Patrick, who wept during the sentencing, said justice had been served.

"We are satisfied as much as you can be [but] you can't replace a loved one."

He said the family's second Christmas without a father would be an "empty" one.

The court heard in the family's victim impact statement that their frail and ailing father had been savagely beaten by a neighbour to whom he had shown generosity.

"The girls that had been given oranges from my Dad's tree later proceeded to break into my Dad's house and attack him," the statement read.

"What kind of exchange is that?"

Justice Geoffrey Venning said Te Wini knew Mr Rowe as the "old man across the fence", and she had suggested his house as a target for a robbery.

For this reason, he did not accept the plea of lawyer Gene Tomlinson that she be given a non-parole period of 14 years.

Justice Venning said Te Wini had played a full and important part in the attack, and had been aware of Mr Rowe's age and frailty.

His illness had left him almost defenceless, and he weighed a gaunt 57kg.

The family said the murder had been "permanently etched" into their family home and they had to revisit the beating as they emptied the house and prepared it for sale.

Patrick Rowe and his sister Wendy showed signs of relief once the sentence was given, smiling and hugging their supporters outside the courthouse.

The two slender girls, who will remain in jail until they are in their 30s, were blank-faced as they were led from the dock.

Members of their family in the gallery held back tears and were too distraught to speak to the Weekend Herald.

The court heard that both Churchward and Te Wini had lived transient lifestyles, moving homes regularly between relatives in different cities.

Justice Venning noted that, at 13, Te Wini had been expelled from college after two weeks because of disruptive behaviour.

She had spent most of her time since sleeping or smoking cannabis, and told a probation officer that at times she ate only once every three days.

By the time she was 14, she had had two relationships with men with gang affiliations and suffered from a stress disorder.

A pre-sentencing report on Churchward said she was intelligent, "full of promise", and in other circumstances could have led a completely different life.

She had been abused by an older relative and lived in an abusive relationship with a man recently released from prison.

Justice Venning told the girls: "You are victims of the failure of your own families to provide any sort of direction, support or encouragement to learn any sort of values ... They failed you in the most basic of ways.

"It's a tragedy, but you will be given more life skills in prison than you received [at home]."

He accentuated that life imprisonment was exactly that - life. The non-parole period was just part of that sentence.